 |
||||||||||||||||||
|
Another life would also change that fateful day. A young mother, Ann Maguire, walking with her children, Mark, John, Joanne and Andrew would suffer a loss so great recovery would be impossible. Provisional I.R.A., on a mission to kill British soldiers, opened fire from the back of a speeding car on an Army foot patrol. They missed. The foot patrol returned fire killing the driver of the car, a young man named Danny Lennon. The car careened out of control, mounted the pavement and slammed into Ann Maguire and her children. I had heard the shots ring out. Indeed, after years of violence on the streets of Belfast, I could distinguish gunfire. The first shots, the high velocity pinging sound of an Armalite rifle ,the chosen weapon of the Provisional I.R.A., the second round of fire, the slow thud of the self-loading rifle, the British Army's weapon of choice. I had heard the screech of tires as the I.R.A. car, with a dead man slumped over the wheel, sped towards my car. Every nerve end in my body jolted. My beautiful baby daughter, Deborah, was strapped into her car seat behind me. I remember screaming, "Sweet Jesus, my baby," as I pulled left on the steering wheel and watched the other car mount the pavement. As I pulled up and stopped, through he windscreen I watched the awful carnage. As I write these words, almost 30 years later, as if in slow motion I can still see the slaughter. Ann Maguire, a few seconds beforehand a vibrant young mother, lying like a rag doll on the pavement, her babies scattered round her. I ran to see if I could help. The only assistance I could give was to hold Joanne Maguire as she died, her big blue eyes staring at me as she took her final breath. "I love you wee one," I whispered, while inside I raged at the senseless loss. A short time later John and Andrew Maguire died from their horrific injuries. They tell me I was in shock. A few hours of my life went missing. My next memory was standing in my garage screaming. The sickening cycle of useless violence in my native Ireland had, up to that date, achieved nothing. And as, in every war, the people paying the highest price were the mothers and children. Something inside of me snapped and a burning anger took over. It had to stop. Over the years the terrorists had succeeded in crippling my society with fear. That awful day removed any fear I may have had because I was only too aware, as a young mother myself that Ann Maguire could have been me and the Maguire children could have been mine. I grabbed a notebook, got in my car and drove to an area that was an I.R.A. stronghold. And so with a petition for peace I began banging on doors, challenging women, screaming at them in a very unpeaceful like fashion. We must stop this carnage, we must end this violence. One woman later told me she was afraid not to sign the peace petition that I'd scared her so badly and so a peace movement was born. The newspapers very quickly picked up the story of an ordinary Belfast mother campaigning on the doorsteps, collecting signatures for peace. I was asked to do an interview for BBC television, lunchtime news. In that interview I pleaded with the women of Northern Ireland to join me in a rally at the spot where the children were killed, the following Saturday at 3:00 p.m. On the morning of the rally a young man from a local radio station asked me how many people I expected to turn up. That was something I really hadn't given any thought to. I had called many immediate family and knew that there would be at least 20 people there. But I had no concept of what was about to happen. Buses began to roll up the street. Some came from the Catholic Falls Road, others from the Protestant Shankill Road. I witnessed a miracle as 10,000 women poured onto the street and without words being spoken, ran into each other's arms, their humanity overcoming all religious bigotry as they stood together as mothers. As they held each other and cried, over 800 years of religious hatred, bigotry and ignorance was wiped out with one hug. And thus began the change in the politics of Northern Ireland. A series of rallies, 12 in all, some 30, 50 and 100,000 strong united the Northern Irish women as never before. While the rallies were enormously important, I knew that rallying alone would never solve the problems of Northern Ireland. Much more needed to be done. - Our society made up of 1.5 million people, one million Protestant, .5 million Catholic was infected totally with injustice. There was a Protestant government for a Protestant people. Catholics were very much second class citizens denied access to higher education, forced to live in substandard housing and work at the most menial of jobs. Indeed it was not unusual to read in the help wanted sections of our newspapers, a job description followed by in bold print the stipulation, 'Protestant Only Need Apply.' - We had the worse housing conditions in Western Europe and the worst unemployment problem in Western Europe. Up to 14 1/2 percents of my people without work. And pocket areas where that figure went as high as 89 percent unemployment. Our educational system was completely segregated. I was only too aware all of these problems must be dealt with before any kind of just and peaceful solutions could be found. The answers for the people of Northern Ireland would never come from the top down. The solutions must be created from the bottom up. And so we set about creating new housing, opening small factories and most importantly, the beginning of educating our children together. We opened the first integrated school in Northern Ireland, Lagan College. We started with 12 pupils, six Catholic, six Protestant and a portable school room in 1978. Lagan College now covers a hillside and provides a superb education to over 1200 pupils with a waiting list in utero. Because the peace movement in Northern Ireland started with the death of the Maguire children, somehow people thought I was an expert on children's issues. I was not. It was only by being in the field worldwide that I very quickly learned the desperate situation of the majority of the world's children. I can now honestly say I am now an expert on children's suffering. I find myself repeating over and over again that 9/11 was, to quote Roosevelt, "A date that will live on in infamy." In New York 3,030 people were murdered in the name of Allah. And on that same day 35, 615 children died from conditions of starvation and nobody said a word. Upwards of 40,000 children die every day from hunger. In a world that can feed itself, yet chooses to grow weapons instead of food, we so called Christians should all hang our heads in shame for allowing it to happen. On March 11, 2004 in another act of slaughter of the innocent 200 people died and 1,700 were wounded in the atrocity of the bombing of the early morning commuter train in Madrid. The people of Spain reeled in horror at the devastation and grotesqueness of such an act. The Spanish wanted no part of the invasion of Iraq. Indeed, the highest recorded numbers of protesters in the world took place in Spain. People took to the streets in their millions to protest Spain's involvement. That fact alone should have influenced the terrorists not to hold the Spanish people responsible for their government's involvement in the invasion. In their wisdom, thank God, the Spanish people very quickly replaced the government that was part of the Coalition of the Willing. And we must remember once more that on March 11, 2004 upwards of 40,000 children died from conditions of malnutrition. As Christians we are taught, "What you do to the smallest of my creations you do unto me." "If you love me feed my sheep," another of the teachings of the simple man known as Jesus of Nazareth. In his farewell to Peter before his crucifixion he held his disciple and told him, "Upon this rock I shall build my church, my peace I leave you, my peace I give unto you." No, I have not suddenly become a born-again Christian. If all my sins were written on my forehead, I could not go out in public! But, I find myself furious at those who profess to love God while killing in his name; "Thou shalt not kill," being one of the commandments. There are no i.e.'s in this commandment and God knows I have looked. So how can the Bishops of my holy catholic and apostolic faith condemn abortion while never mentioning the destruction of war? I am also incensed by the fact the majority of those slaughtered every day in our world are the littlest of God's creations; babies, little gifts from God, precious morsels of life. Pure, sweet, helpless babies condemned to death by man, some only minutes after being born. In the midst of plenty, according to the World Hunger Report, 842 million of our brothers and sisters starve to death. The report states that by the year 2020 HIV will have killed 20% of Africa's workforce, mostly agricultural workers. Famine worsens the AIDS epidemic because those affected by famine are more liable to move off the land to urban centers, where the risk of HIV infection is higher and women and children end up selling sex for money and food-thus becoming more vulnerable to HIV infection. Hunger also makes those already infected with HIV more susceptible to opportunistic infections. Once they have developed full-blown AIDS their capacity to absorb nutrition from food is reduced. Even with drug therapy HIV/AIDs sufferers need to have access to a better diet to help fight the effects of the disease. 100,000 dead, most of them women and children. 100,000, a mind-blowing statistic. Last year, the Lancet Medical Journal using credible methodology reported 100,000 Iraqi civilians, most of them women and children, have died since the invasion of Iraq. The governments of the U.K. and America moved at breakneck speed to cast doubt on the Lancet findings. Citing other studies, they put the number of Iraqi citizen's deaths at about 15,000. They must have pulled these figures out of the air since neither the U.K. or the U.S. admits to collecting any such data. Reading accounts of the U.S. led invasion I am struck by the constant casual reference to civilian deaths. Members of the military speak of destroying hundreds of vehicles, supposedly carrying terrorists that turned out to be crammed with innocent civilians. In the bloody battle for Nassiriya, U.S. Marines pounded civilian targets in a blind bid to suppress insurgents. U.S. and British military officials boast about the accuracy of precision bombing. They claim this type of modern warfare, based on accuracy, is the most humanitarian in history. Dozens of innocent civilians were killed in a vain effort to eliminate Saddam Hussein with "pinpoint" air strikes and numbers of those who have perished in the campaign to eliminate alleged terrorists in Falluja have yet to reach the outside world. Huge arsons of weaponry, billions spent daily on arms and ammunition and better ways to destroy humanity. The nuclear threat becoming a much greater reality than during the Cold War. The U.S.A. led by George Bush and Great Britain led by Tony Blair, men whose deeds will go down in infamy developing more nuclear capability and becoming the world's top bullies. Doesn't Mr. Bush know America has 30 million hungry people of which 13 million are children and England with 36 to 52 thousand homeless in 2003 ages 16 to 24. India, with nuclear capability; headcounts in that vast country are difficult to track, yet we know millions are starving, women and children as usual being the worst affected. North Korea, millions starving, moving at incredible speed to develop nuclear capability. The former Soviet Union economically destroyed. Billions still being spent on arms while 35 million of her people suffer profound hunger. In a recorded video tape, Osama bin Laden boasts that he is succeeding beyond his wildest dreams in destabilizing the American economy. The results of the U.S. war in Iraq he said "Have by the grace of Allah been positive and enormous and have by all standards exceeded all expectations to provoke and bait the Bush administration." Bin Laden also said, "All we have to do is send two mujaheddin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written 'Al Qaeda' in order to make the generals rush there. This causes Americans to suffer human, economic and political losses." Yes, Osama is rubbing his bloodied hands with glee. As far as he is concerned the governments of the U.S. and U.K. led by George Bush and Tony Blair are the greatest enlisters for the Jihad and its many terrorist groups. These groups whose barbarianism knows no bounds. Their cowardice in kidnapping 'easy targets' and hacking their heads from their bodies while recording their grizzly deeds is alien to the Koran and every right thinking Muslim. It furthers no cause and intensifies the resolve not just of the American government and people, but the majority of the world's people to find and eliminate these horrifying practices. 40,000 children die per day, more than 14 million yearly. These are the realities in terms of life. Every 6 seconds somewhere in our world a child dies of hunger and preventable diseases. Over the years, I have listened to many brilliant men and women, each one expert on algebra and figures. Unfortunately, the only figures I can bring to this table are the tragic figures of death and destruction. It is time to turn this unbearable situation of pain and death around. It is time to force governments to be accountable for the suffering of children. It is time to protect the voiceless by creating safe towns where they will be protected. World Centers of Compassion for Children International beginning in Italy will build the first City of Compassion in Matera, Basilicata area. The cities will have everything a child will need to grow up healthy, educated and peace-loving. We will have excellent housing, top medical care and the best educators the world can offer. But the most important thing will be that the children's cities will be off limits to any government attack. I finish by thanking you all for listening and I plead with you to help further the cause of justice for the children of the world. To strengthen human understanding, we must begin in the cradle. Respect for the human family must not only be taught but practiced.
|
|||||||||||||||||
| All Rights Reserved. Contact: office@peaceproposal.com | ||||||||||||||||||
